Action on October 4: Stop City Council from filing more gang injunctions & new youth curfews!

At Thursday morning’s Rules Committee meeting, Oakland City Council Members hashed out the agenda for the October 4 full City Council Meeting.

In addition to proposing an expansion of gang injunctions to neighborhoods in East and West Oakland, Council Members Larry Reid and Igancio De La Fuente recommended a night-time curfew to restrict public movement of all youth under the age of 18. Councilperson Libby Schaaf strongly supported the curfew and proposed widening its scope to include school time hours as well, effectively imposing an around-the-clock curfew for Oakland.

Reid and De La Fuente’s proposal to direct the City Attorney to initiate new gang injunction litigation in East and West Oakland directly counters the May 17 City Council decision to halt all further gang injunctions in Oakland until the City conducts an independent review of the temporary North Oakland injunction and the yet-to-be-implemented Fruitvale Injunction.

In response to fellow Council Members’ support of the youth curfew, Council Member Desley Brooks stated that she wanted a Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice (CJCJ) report and reports on Long Beach’s injunctions to be part of the materials for October 4. According to the CJCJ report, “The Impact of Juvenile Curfew Laws in California,” which was distributed at the meeting, “Despite widespread endorsement of this [curfew] policy approach…the current available data provides no basis to the belief that curfew laws are an effective way for communities to prevent youth crime and keep young people safe. On virtually every measure, no discernible effect on juvenile crime was observed.”

On Thursday morning, members of the STIC commented to the Rules Committee that proposing additional gang injunctions while not even having a partial review of current injunctions was “putting the cart before the horse” and completely contradicted previous Council decisions as well as the desires of Oakland residents.

The Council action seems to preempt the public safety “summit” called for October 15, touted by Mayor Quan in an afternoon press conference. The Mayor said she expects to include up to 1000 participants at the summit.

The October 4th meeting proves to be a showdown of substantial proportions given the overwhelming opposition to the Council’s last attempt to impose a youth curfew in 2009 and sustained opposition to the use of gang injunctions in Oakland.

Look at the agenda here for the details of what was proposed. Items 4.3, 4.4, and 4.12.

Here’s the action plan: Just like May 17, when we halted the use of further injunctions in Oakland for the first time, it’s time to mobilize again. With so many voices in the room and with the dubious, discouraging data from the first year of the North Oakland injunction, we can sway City Council to make informed, sustainable plans for real public safety.